An amazing painting of Eric Roberts riding a white horse in a purple sky

“Roberts is probably the best actor I’ve ever worked with,” Mickey Rourke said of his “The Pope of Greenwich Village” co-star in 2009. “I don’t know why in the last 15 years ain’t nobody give him a chance to show his shit again, because whatever he did 15, 20 years ago should be forgiven. Eric Roberts is the fuckin’ man.”

Fast-forward to 2013, and artist Brandon Bird clearly feels the same way. On Tuesday, the Los Angeles-based artist posted a hi-res version of the above painting of Roberts on his Tumblr, and he gives an elaborate explanation for his craft. Seriously, it sounds like a total backbreaker of a job — to the point where, in Bird’s words, you “reach a stage of the process where you’re like Fuck fuck gotta get this done.”